Honest Stories From the Heart of a Confused, Anxiety-Ridden Catholic

Blessings and Beauty: Introduction

I love art. I love everything about it. Most of all, I love to create it. This Lent I am giving up filters. Well, not just filters, but it is easy to say that as a cover-all. Basically, I am giving up editing any of my pictures in any way. I am on social media pretty often. I love Instagram and I spend a lot of time editing selfies or other scenes to look the prettiest way I can imagine them. I don’t think this is necessarily bad, it’s like creating artwork. At least, that is how I see it. But this Lent I’ve decided to not spend my time on it.

For Lent, I am praising God’s creation by posting completely unaltered pictures of it. Normally, I would spend time on every picture I posted. I would work to make the coloring exactly the way I liked it. I can spend an hour just editing a picture. I like doing it. I think my pictures turn out interesting and representative of who I am. The reason I’ve chosen to let them be for the next 40 days (plus a few Sundays) is because I think it is time I let the natural beauty of the things that God has created and inspired show – instead of what I think should show.

I am not planning to stop posting selfies either. I know that you would think a person with humility would stop posting pictures of themselves, but hear me out. Normally, I would fix the red spots on my face and smooth out the areas that looked bumpy. I would make my red hair a little brighter or a little darker. I’d blur out the background and focus in on my eyes. Now, for the next 40 days, I’m going to post pictures of my natural self with a natural background. I tell people all the time to love what they look like naturally, without filters and touch-ups, and I think it is time I start taking my own advice. I am going to show people how God intended me to be seen, not how I like to be seen. So my goal is to keep posting pictures normally – a few times a week – with zero editing.

But all that is just what I am giving up.

Every year for the past few years I have also taken on something good to do for Lent. I usually only do something extra, but this year I’ve decided to do both. The two things I have decided to do are actually correlating though, and have everything to do with this blog. I know that this blog is new, if you are even reading this it is a little miracle in my book. I am going to blog every day until Easter Sunday. The topic every day will be one beautiful thing I have found in God’s creation. I can’t repeat topics. I have to do it before midnight every day. And I can’t write them the day before and schedule them. I have to write about how beautiful the world is every day. That is my challenge for myself.

If you have some free time, your prayers would be appreciated. It is going to be difficult and scary. It is going to take some humility on my part to post pictures of my face and body without altering. It will be difficult to want to change the focus of a picture, but know that the natural focus is what God means to be seen in the picture. Fighting what I want and letting the natural focus win is going to be very hard for me. I guess that is why I picked it though.

If you have yet to pick out your Lenten promise, you are running a little behind, but you are welcome to steal my ideas. I am welcome to hearing your thoughts on my promise, so feel free to share them in the comments. First post coming within the hour. I’m already running behind, imagine that!